Although the official statement released on Friday by China’s Consulate General in Toronto denied any role in the protests by the Chinese students against Tibetan girl’s victory in a University election, reports published by Chinese mouth piece, Global Times suggest otherwise. The reports claim that China supports the Chinese students’ actions.
Chinese students at the University of Toronto, Scarborough campus recently protested the 22 year old Tibetan girl, Chemi Lhamo was elected as the president student union. Another group of Chinese students at McMaster University in Ontario crudely opposed and disrupted a speech by activist Rukiye Turdush’s speech critical of the Chinese government’s treatment of Uighurs.
To protest against Chemi Lhamo’s election, the Chinese students, which has a huge number in the United States and Canada, started a petition calling against election. Besides gathering more than 10,000 signatures in the petition, huge number of Chinese students are abusing the Tibetan girl on her social media pages.
Activists and policy experts suggest the students are being directly monitored by the Beijing administration. Michel Juneau-Katsuya, a former senior CSIS official for the Asia-Pacific region explained that it is their strategy to try to undermine, to try to mute any form of opposition or dissidence that could at one point or another gain access to a mic.
While the Chinese Embassy in Canada denied of any role of the Chinese government, the statement also said, “We strongly support the just and patriotic actions of Chinese students. Safeguarding sovereignty and opposing separatism are the common positions of the international community, and they are also the positions the Canadian government upholds,”
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